search by extent

[Anonymous User]

Search by extent does not work. I had it set to search ArcGIS Online in the webmap Add Data and limited to map extent. I was using it for a class I am teaching as an example of using ArcGIS Online and things from around the world were coming up when I was zoomed to my county in Georgia. Not much to test. Happened on various machines and browsers, latest versions. No other layers had been loaded. Anyone else seeing that?  Without limiting to extent, a massive amount of irrelevant layers from around the globe overwhelm the search result list.

[RobertScheitlin__GISP]

Kevin,

   I see the same issue. Sounds like something to report to esri tech support.

[Anonymous User]

Thank you Robert - I have noted it. I put this and the popup highlight bug on the beta forum.

[Scott_Harris]

Can you please link to an example of a layer that shows up when you set the filter to "Only show content within the map area" when the map is centered on a county in the state of Georgia?

I am interested to know the the extent that is set on the item.

[Anonymous User]

Greetings Scott. Zoom to Chatham County, search for something generic, like 'rivers' and you'll be inundated with results. Even if services don't have the right spatial extent listed in REST (if the spatial index gets out of whack), I'd think AGOL should have some kind of logic to determine the maximum extent of the actual feature data in a service in order to head this issue off.

[Scott_Harris]

Here are the steps I'm following (just making sure we're on the same page)

When I search for Chatham County, GA, USA (so the map is centered over it).

click Add > Search for Layers.

choose to search in "ArcGIS Online".

type in "rivers".

set the Filter to "Only show content within map area".

I get 1,759 layers returned.

FYI - I think the search accounts for the "Extent" property that is set on the Item Details page. See this link, under Extent: Item details—ArcGIS Online Help | ArcGIS 

[Anonymous User]

Scott, roger that- exactly.

[Scott_Harris]

Ok thanks for confirming... now the question is are you finding items that have an extent that falls outside of Chatham County, GA?

So far, I'm not seeing any. Especially if I also set a filter to only show "Authoritative" content. More on that here:

Item details—ArcGIS Online Help | ArcGIS 

https://www.esri.com/arcgis-blog/products/arcgis-online/announcements/whats-new-public-authoritative... 

[Anonymous User · Accepted solution]

Hi Scott,  I think in the near term, I'd suggest making 'Authoritative' turned on by default. In the long term, have AGOL scan the data and ensure no data that is not literally in the extent, show up in results, regardless of whether it's authoritative.  I will test a little more later, but regardless of the latter point, most public or even GIS users will probably not realize they should be checking the Authoritative box. They will probably just be overwhelmed by the results, or just click the "first thing on the top of the list" because we have all been "Google" conditioned.   And they'll just go with that, even if it's "Scott's Cool River layer", ya know!

[Scott_Harris]

Thanks, Kevin. I think this Idea could be relevant: Sort ArcGIS.com searches by extent